A Radio Access Network (RAN) device is typically configured according to the capacity for processing traffic at a peak time. However the actual amount of traffic varies over time. For example, the amount of traffic is high in the daytime and low at midnight.
With the introduction of an advanced energy management mechanism, the device and some functions thereof can be disabled, or resource consumption of the device and some functions thereof can be limited, at a low amount of traffic (e.g., at midnight) for the purpose of energy saving. For example, a base station can operate at high transmission power in the daytime to support a higher amount of traffic and reduce its transmission power at a low amount of traffic at midnight. The base station can even enter a dormancy mode in which no data signal is transmitted at a very low amount of traffic. In this way, energy consumption throughout the system can be saved without degrading the quality of a service.
However, reduced transmission power or entering the dormancy mode may result in an influence on a signal coverage area and some user equipments may also have to be handovered to the neighboring base station. An energy saving base station and adjacent base stations thereof have to perform respective operations to adjust transmission power and maintain the user experience. For example, when a specific energy saving base station enters the dormancy mode, several adjacent base stations thereof have to boost transmission power to maintain signal coverage with no coverage holes.
However arbitrarily reduced transmission power may result in signal coverage holes and have a significant influence upon the user experience, and arbitrarily increased transmission power of an adjacent base station may result in serious inter-cell interference.
Therefore a requirement for a specific feasible technical solution is needed to save energy consumption of a system without degrading the quality of a service.